until the devil turns to dust
by thequeenofokay
Summary: When they first meet, they are both a little battered. / / au in which Skye and Ward met as screwed up teens and joined SHIELD then HYDRA together.
1. cant stand to be so dead behind the eyes

**notes:**

+ i've had this idea in my head since turn, turn, turn. and i obviously decided that midnight when i should be studying exams was the time to write it.

+ it should hopefully be three chapters long - before they join coulson's team, pre episode 17, and post it.

+ title from "we don't eat" by james vincent mcmorrow and chapter title from "touch" by daughter.

* * *

When they first meet, they are both a little battered.

Correction.

She is a little battered. She's just got a split lip. She got it in a fight with a guy at the orphanage. It wasn't his fault, honestly. It was maybe hers. She's always been so stubborn. It was still her turn on the computer, he tried to shove her off… it escalated.

It feels like the story of her life. She runs away afterwards, because she doesn't want to face the repercussions.

Him, though. He's slumped against the wall of the alley. He has a broken rib, an eye bruised blue and there's blood dripping from scalp.

Skye sees him before he sees her. She's hesitant at first. He looks a few years older than her, maybe fourteen. He's probably about a foot taller than her as well. He could probably crush her too, ant style.

But then again, he doesn't look like he's going to.

She slides down beside him in the dirt and the mud, and he doesn't say anything, so she just starts speaking.

Actually, she wants to be crying. She feels so damn tired. She's eleven, for god's sake. And it feels like she's been taken away from three times as many foster homes. Now she's sitting in a gutter.

But she just speaks, because talking is easy, and it's all she does.

"My god," she says. "My head hurts." She touches her lip. It's a little swollen, and there's blood on her fingertips. "That stupid bastard," she says. "Not that he hit that hard, but he caught me off guard." She grins a blood stained smile. "I bit him though."

He looks at her then. He's pressing his own fingers to his head wound.

"Ew," Skye says. "You look awful." She reaches up to touch him, but he flinches away. "Get in a fight?" she asks.

He nods. "My brother."

She winces internally. That's harsh. "Bastard," she says instead.

"How old are you?" he asks, like it's despicable that she just minorly swore when she's so tiny.

"Eleven," she says. And it's the truth, for once. He looks like the kind of guy who could use the truth every once in a while. "I'm Skye." She waits for him to answer, but when he offers nothing she gives him a little push. "What about you?"

"Grant Ward," he tells her.

* * *

They take to each other like damaged mutant fish would take to water contaminated with toxic waste.

Which is to say, well.

The orphanage is pretty used to her being a little lax about coming back for curfew. They never go to his house. From what she's heard, it's literally the most miserable place since hell.

Usually, they take a drive.

She hotwires the car, he drives. He let her once, and his assessment of her ability was, "Remind me never _ever_ to make that mistake again." (He was clinging to his seat, looking a little pale, but he's just a wimp.)

They take a drive to somewhere nobody no one knows their names. It's easier for her than him. She's a little shadow. He's made a bit of a name for himself, picking fights where he shouldn't.

They stop usually stop at a garage. Tonight they hit one about half an hour out of town. It's quiet, and there's only one assistant on, who looks pretty much asleep and possibly slightly drunk.

Honestly, it would be a crime _not_ to grab themselves a drink and something to eat each. She does it mostly for the thrill, usually she gets enough to eat at the orphanage. She thinks he does it more out of necessity.

They're good, both of them. They've never been caught. On busier days he'll keep a lookout while she grabs, but there's no need for that tonight.

They go a couple miles further, after that. They stop at a park and climb onto the hood of the car, cheesy movie style.

Except in cheesy movies, the car and the snacks aren't stolen, he doesn't have a nasty cut on his cheek and a bruised rib that makes it hurts to laugh, and they aren't twelve and fifteen respectively.

He's usually pretty quiet, but that's okay, because Skye talks enough for the both of them. And when she doesn't they can just sit there, and it's okay. It's nice.

It's a little chilly. She doesn't shiver, because she knows he'll give her his jacket, and she doesn't want that.

"It's five years today," he says. It's not very specific, but Skye _knows_.

Five years since Grant's little brother died, after even life support failed to keep him alive. He took a while to tell her about it, but the fact that she does fills her with a quiet sort of pride.

She leans against his shoulder, wraps her arms around his muscular body, and he doesn't flinch away. "Sorry," she says. She feels him nod and squeezes tighter. His family almost makes her glad she doesn't have one. Not that she doesn't think every night of the mother and father she's missing out on. She's told him about how when she's older she'll find them. No matter why they left her, she just wants to know where she came from.

"Do you ever think," she asks, because tonight is a serious conversation kind of night, she can tell, "that it's unfair? That people have to live like us?"

He laughs, but she knows he doesn't find it funny at all. "You're asking me?"

"I know," she sighs. "I just want to change it. That's what I wanna do when I grow up. I want to change the world." It feels childish and silly, but he doesn't laugh or make fun of her, so he must understand.

* * *

She gets sent back from another foster home. This one stings her like most of the others haven't. She thought she was finally finding a family.

She shouldn't really follow Grant's example, because she sees where it gets him, and that's nowhere good. But she picks a fight anyway, with a guy way taller than her, who looked at her wrong.

Grant finds her.

He lands the guy in hospital. It's only a few stitches, but nevertheless.

Skye wants to be angry, because she can take care of herself, thank you very much.

But it's nice to know someone has your back.

(Maybe she does have a family.)

* * *

She is fifteen and he is eighteen. She looks older, though. She acts older too. They steal vodka instead of lemonade. He's got a girlfriend. Her name begins with C (Chrissie? Carrie?) and she smokes more than Skye drinks.

Skye's not jealous, but she feels Grant is attractive enough to find a girl who doesn't taste like cigarettes.

She knows what's coming before it does. He's going to leave. He's going to leave his hellhole of a house and he's going to leave _her_.

And in the end it's Skye that causes it, which makes her feel sick. If only she hadn't been so stupid. If only he wasn't so protective.

They're at some party that his girlfriend got them into. It's dark and the floor is sticky with booze. Skye's wearing a dress that's short enough that it hasn't even heard of knees, let alone ankles. She drinks a lot, more than usual, because he's going to go any day soon.

She knows she's going to throw up. Grant asks her if she's okay, and she nods, because she doesn't need him holding her hair, thanks very much. She's not a child.

She stumbles into the alley out the back. She doesn't notice the guy following her until he's upon her pressing her to the wall, one hand on her throat and the other trying to push her dress up.

She screams. He presses his hand to her mouth and she bites down hard and screams again.

Grant is there, then. He's hurt people for her before, but this time it's worse.

They've both had the odd assault charge before, but none of them have ever been pursued.

This is different.

It's two in the morning, and Skye is curled on a chair in the police station. They've given up trying to send her home. She won't go. Not until she sees him.

There was a man came in about half an hour ago. He flashed a badge at the officers and they ushered him through.

Skye can't help but picture the worst. Was it the FBI? CIA? How bad was what Grant did? Maybe it was someone really important that he beat up. Some government guy. And now they're trying to cover it up.

At three when Grant appears, she is nearly falling asleep. The man is with him. His name is Garret, he's with SHIELD, Grant explains to her.

"They want people like me, who can fight," he explains to her. "And if I go with him, they'll drop all the charges." He's crouched in front of her chair, holding her little hands in his.

She smiles up at him, unable to help herself feeling guilty about what he's done for her. "Good," she says. "When do you leave?"

He looks pained at that. "Tomorrow morning," he says. "I'm going to the SHIELD academy, and then Agent Garrett is going to be my supervising officer." He must see her face fall, her world crumple up, because he gives her hands a little squeeze. She tried to hide it, but he can see through her now (and she'd be lying if she said it didn't scare her a little bit). "It'll be fine," he assures her. "You'll be able to join too in a few years. This is what we said we'd do. Change the world."

* * *

After he's gone, she gets in with people even more toxic.

Grant could keep her grounded. He could protect her when she screwed up.

Miles just exaggerates the dark edge to her. He doesn't protect her, he helps her to make a mess.

He teaches her to hack. She's always been good with computers, but with his help she's unstoppable.

"You can find your parents," he tells her. They search, but all roads lead to SHIELD, so Skye goes back to messing up until she can join. She leaves the school and the orphanage the second she's sixteen.

(Literally the second. She checks on her watch. She doesn't know what time she was born, but as soon as it's midnight she's out the door and into Miles's beat-up car.)

* * *

Skye signs up for SHIELD as soon as she's eighteen. Grant has already graduated Operations a few years early, and is training under Agent Garrett. She gets put into Communications, but it's literally easier than breathing.

Grant comes and visits her when she's been there a few months.

"What do you think?" he asks her. They sit on her bed. He's on the end, looking awfully proper in a uniform and everything. It makes her feel a little self-conscious, sitting on her pillow in her tiny pyjamas.

But then she reminds herself that this is Grant Ward, the boy - man - who has seen her at her worst like noone else has.

"It's… easy," she decides. "I know better ways to do everything they're trying to teach me. And it feels like everything we're doing…" She trails off, chewing on her lip. "I don't know. Are we really fighting for change? Because it just feels like I'm being taught to invade people's privacy for the sake of bureaucracy."

Grant nods, leaning back against the wall. "That's what I thought for a while," he admits. "They try to tell you that you're the line between the normal world and something worse, but I felt like we were just keeping people in the dark."

"For a while?" Skye leans forward.

He nods again. "Then, see, Garrett started training me. He's part of this secret organisation _within_ SHIELD called HYDRA, that want order and are working towards the greater good. People wouldn't have to suffer like we did," he tells her. She sense that he shouldn't be telling her this, from the _secret_ bit, but they've always kept each other safe, kept each other's secrets. "They're more extreme than SHIELD, but that just means they'll get it done."

"So you joined?" Skye asks.

"Yes. It's for the greater good," he says again. "For change."

* * *

She graduates Communications after a year and is assigned straight to the Triskelion.

"It's perfect," Garrett tells her. "You'll be able to access anything." Nobody questions that Garrett and Grant visit her. She's pretty sure everyone thinks Grant is her boyfriend, but what the hell. It's a reasonable cover, so nobody suspects anything.

Not that anyone would. HYDRA is deep in SHIELD, and nobody has realised.

Skye at least feels vaguely more useful at the Triskelion. Garrett was right. She can hack her way into thousands of files, despite her low clearance level, and she bleeds through anything she thinks might be useful.

All the while, she looks for anything on her parents, but anything she finds is covered in more red tape than she can hack her way through.

And she does her actual job, of course, but that doesn't take very much effort. She could work for about half an hour and spend the rest of the day playing Galaga if she wanted, to be honest.

She moans to Grant on the phone about how easy it is pretty much every time he calls. (He doesn't call as often as she'd like.) Eventually, she must wear him down.

"You should come out into the field," he says suddenly one time, cutting her off mid sentence.

"What?" she asks.

"Come out into the field," he repeats. "I could train you. Be your SO."

"Really?" Skye asks. "Would you do that?"

"Of course," he says, like it's the dumbest question he's ever heard. "I know what you're capable of. You could be amazing out here."

* * *

There is a ferocity in them both. It's a product of their beginnings, but it makes Skye feel invincible. Sometimes she thinks it can't be blood that runs through her veins, but something much colder and darker.

They are unstoppable together, too. They compliment each other perfectly. Just like when they were younger, he is the brute force and she is the shadow, sneaking through the cracks in armour. They are legends in both of their organisations, and in high demand.

She never thought she would be a killer. When she can't sleep at night she tells herself they were terrible people. Sometimes it is for SHIELD she kills, sometimes for HYDRA.

But she can't quench the writhing in her stomach when she kills a researcher and mother of three on Garrett's orders. She tries to shut her heart down, but it's there, that gnawing feeling that this is /wrong/.

"Are we good people?" she asks Grant. They're in a hotel room, waiting orders on their next assignment. There's a bottle on the bed between them, almost empty.

"No," he says. "But we never were, even before we joined SHIELD or HYDRA."

She nods in agreement. She was screwed up from the beginning.

"Are you happy?" he asks suddenly.

Skye is taken by surprise. "I don't know," she answers, honestly, because she is never anything else with him. "What does it feel like?" Her voice is soft, timid.

He's looking at her like she's some kind of angel, fallen to earth. A mixture of sadness and pure adoration. Skye hates that she could do that to him.

She closes the space between them, thinking maybe this will make her stomach stop writhing. She pulls him in by the front of his shirt to meet her. He doesn't draw away. She knows he never would. She'd seen that look in his eyes a hundred times before. He'd wanted this since they were teenagers. She couldn't let either of them get hurt like that.

His hand goes to the back her hair as he kisses her. He presses her back against the mattress, moving his attention to her neck. The feeling in her stomach has definitely changed. It's hunger now, pure and raw.

* * *

Their assignment is simple enough in principle - infiltrate Coulson's team, find out how he came back from the dead. But it requires going into deep cover and careful planning.

They are exactly the kinds of people Coulson wants - two broken people he will think he can fix. Everyone knows they come as package deal, too. They're who you call if Strike Team Delta is busy and you need a pair with almost as much skill, just as much sex (because honestly, that Clint and Natasha are doing it is obvious) and just as much emotional baggage.

They have plans for winning the trust of the other team members too. Simmons, the biochemist, is Skye's to befriend. She'll charm Fitz like she can charm anyone. The Cavalry is the no-strings sex type, which will be up to Grant. (There isn't any time for jealousy.)

They arrive at the BUS with their bags, ready for their first assignment.

Some superpowered guy exposed by the Rising Tide.

Skye looks up at Grant as they walk up the cargo ramp towards the pair of bickering scientists. He gives her a little nod, and she knows it says, _we can do this_.


	2. in the darkness i will meet my creators

**notes:**

+ look what i finally finished! it turned out longer than i was expecting, but there you go. now you just have to wait like another month and a half for part three probably.

+ also i'm kinda expecting there to be some mistakes in this. bc it's nearly 3am but i just wanted to get it posted. so please please point them out.

+ chapter title from "smother" by daughter.

* * *

Skye leans back, folds her arms, looks round the room. FitzSimmons are across the lab from her, engrossed in some gun that they're experimenting with.

She's been cleaning up the sound on the file from before the Centipede lab exploded that she found on the site of a hacking group. She could do it in her sleep, but she's been taking her time, trying to decide how much it's safe to give the team without them actually being able to do too much damage to Centipede.

Grant's been hovering behind her. She can tell he's lost already. FitzSimmons keep assaulting him with questions. At one point they actually started prodding at him with cotton buds, and Skye thought it was probably the best thing they'd seen since they'd gone undercover at a dance contest.

(Until Simmons physically opens Skye's mouth for her and swabs the inside of her cheek. Then she is with Grant in feeling that these two are maybe a bit handsy.)

Their first mission with their new team is to neutralise a rogue Centipede experiment. It's the first time they've encountered the HYDRA faction with SHIELD, which means pretending they've not a clue what it is.

She'd like to try to ask Grant what to do. Does she let them work out that Centipede is developing super-soldiers? Does she help them track Mike Peterson?

Unfortunately, while Skye doesn't think that FitzSimmons are likely to notice if she and Grant take a quick wander for some covert discussion, the Cavalry is upstairs. And Skye won't be taking any chances with that woman.

"Guys," Skye says finally. "I'm done." The scientists leap delightedly into action. It's like watching little sugarhigh children at Christmas.

Which is something Skye actually does have experience with. Except that FitzSimmons are probably used to better presents than the children back at the orphanage.

They track Peterson to Union Station, trying to escape with his son. Skye and Grant are both of the opinion that it would be easiest just to put a bullet in the guy's brain. (They may or may not both be a little biased. They don't let it show. They smoothly argue that he's dangerous, collateral damage in saving many more lives.)

Coulson is having none of it. He drags them all down to the station, and gives Peterson some motivational speech to try and change his ways or something equally cheesy. Which would probably have been an interesting listen, but Skye is too busy fighting off HYDRA's _own soldiers_ to be able to listen in. Only once Skye has knocked the last guy out and sustained nothing more than a nasty cut lip, and Coulson has made them stall and stall until FitzSimmons have the Night Night Gun ready (Skye wonders if Dorky Naming is an actual course at SciTech) does he finally let Grant shoot Peterson.

Later, when everyone is in bed except the Cavalry, who is in the cockpit, Skye and Grant head down to the cargo bay with a bottle of scotch and bandages for their hands. They get out the punching bag, wrap their knuckles.

The bottle sits at the side, waiting. They take turns punching. In silence.

"I've talked to Garrett," Grant says eventually, holding the bag steady for her. "They've got their eye on Peterson."

Skye nods. "He'll be valuable, long as he's stabilised," she says.

Silence again. Then, "You good so far?"

She blinks at him. "Why wouldn't I be?"

He gives her a look. "You know why. This isn't what we're used to. It's not just us anymore."

Skye smiles, reassuringly, because he might as well have just told her he was worried. "That's the point," she reminds him. "Take us out of our comfort zone. It's endearing to the rest of them."

He nods. "Right."

She stops punching to reach for him. "We'll be fine," she says. "It's still just us, really. We just have to keep the same backup for longer."

"We haven't had backup for years," he points out, and she just shrugs, going back to punching.

* * *

They're standing guard outside the site of an 0-8-4 in Peru while Fitzsimmons poke and prod. Grant has his arms folded and is tapping his foot, obviously impatient.

Skye smirks. "Really?"

"I didn't think I signed up to be a guard dog," he says, looking a little irritable. "Couldn't the Cavalry do this?"

She walks over to him, arms sliding around his neck. "You know," she says, with a teasing smile, "I don't think she likes being called that. Maybe I'll have to tell on you."

He gives her a frowny faux worried face. "You wouldn't dare," he says, running his hands through her hair.

Skye raises an eyebrow, tilts her head to the side. "You know me."

Something changes in his face then. Skye frowns up at him. It isn't something she said - they've had this conversation before a hundred times over. "Grant?" she asks.

"We have company," he says.

She draws away from him at that, pulling the gun out from her jacket, and they move round each other until they're close to back-to-back in their traditional combat stance.

"Ready?" she asks.

He smirks. "Let them shoot first," he reminds her.

"Less like an execution," she finishes, because she's that confident in their abilities, and has every right to be. This won't be the first army she's taken on with him.

The first one comes out the bushes, and Skye shoots him straight in the head. She can hear a car, maybe more than one, approaching.

"Fitzsimmons!" she yells, not looking back as she takes another shot. "Pack up, it's time to go."

They clear a path back to the van, and manage to get themselves, the 0-8-4, and Fitzsimmons there in mostly one piece. They race back to the Bus, to find Coulson has already arrived there with some old friend. Only Phil Coulson could manage to find old friends in the Amazon rainforest.

"Rebels on our tail," Grant tells him. "We need to move."

"We know," Coulson tells them. "They found us, too. May's on it."

Skye huffs, stomping up the stairs as the plane takes off while Fitzsimmons babble about the 0-8-4 in the background. It's been a mess of a day, and she doesn't exactly feel like she signed up for the Dream Team, more like a ragtag bunch of strays_._ She slumps onto the sofa, and Grant sits down beside her with a bottle of scotch.

She grabs it off him, taking a gulp. Coulson would probably disapprove. He has a lovely set of glasses in the cabinet, but that's the way they do it, and Coulson is going to have to get used to it.

Grant takes the bottle back, following her lead. She leans against him, hears him hiss through his teeth before he can try to hide it.

The noble fucker. She sits up, going straight for his side.

"Grant," she snaps, finding the bloody stain on his t-shirt. "You've been shot."

"It's nothing," he assures her. "Just a scratch."

"Doesn't matter. It'll still scar if you don't patch it up."

"I _did _patch it up," he insists.

"Well obviously not very _well_," she returns. "Stay there, I'll get some of that fancy stuff from the lab." She stands up, and sits straight back down. "New plan. You're gonna have to wait."

She inclines her head slightly towards their Peruvian guests, who aren't hiding their hostility well enough, and Grant gives a tiny nod of understanding. He picks up the bottle by its neck, and she pulls a knife from her pocket.

"We might as well get this over with," she sighs.

At some point, maybe when she's kicking a guy in the head after he tries to get to Simmons, Skye realises this whole mission to infiltrate the team might be harder than she'd expected.

She's done undercover. She's done lots of undercover. She and Grant are _good_ at undercover. She's spent months at a time as somebody else.

But this is different. Her cover is herself. Yes, there is a plan and strategies to play on the emotions of each specific team member, but ultimately these people are going to get to know her.

Some of her, at least.

There's only one who even get's close to knowing all of her.

These people will never, ever, know her as well as Grant does.

* * *

She volunteers herself to infiltrate Quinn's mansion. She's really the only one for the job. She can hack herself a cover in seconds and get herself an invite.

Plus, she's heard that she and Quinn have certain shared loyalties.

She wears the pink dress, the one she first wore in Prague. The one that Grant loves, and mostly she wears it because of the way that he stares (and because of what usually comes next. They alomst blew a mission once because of this dress).

She sidles into Quinn's mansion, charming smile on her lips, and Fitzsimmons and May chattering in her ear.

She sneaks off during Quinn's speech to activate the beacon in her compact, but he finds her trying to get into his office.

Shit.

Her options are limited, and she'd really been hoping to do this without revealing herself.

"I just wanted a chance to talk with you," she says, when he confronts her. She grabs a pen and paper, scribbles quickly. "Honestly."

_Hail Hydra_

Quinn invites her into his office at that. She sits herself down on his sofa.

"So why are you here?" he asks her.

Good question. "I work with the Clairvoyant," she says slowly. Watches as recognition flashes across his eyes.

"You've met the Clairvoyant?" Quinn asks. There's an eagerness in his voice that he hasn't been able to disguise.

Skye smiles. "I have," she says. "We've worked together very closely." She pulls out the compact, checks herself in the mirror and waits for the little light to show up green. Objective accomplished. She sets it down again.

"What can you tell me?" Quinn asks, leaning forwards, towards her.

She laughs lightly at his enthusiasm. She's got about ten seconds to go, before someone will alert Quinn of the breach. "Well," she says. "We're interested in an angle within SHIELD right now."

Right on cue, Quinn's guards burst in. "We have a security breach, sir," one tells him. "Someone disabled the perimeter field from within the compound. SHIELD are inside our walls."

Skye sighs dramatically, stands up, and pulls out her gun.

Quinn turns on her. "You're with them?" he asks, incredulous.

Skye shrugs, pointing at his forehead. "I did say within SHIELD."

"Stop her!" Quinn orders his guards.

Skye rolls her eyes. She knocks the first out with the butt of her gun and hits the second in the solar plexus. The last one raises his hands in surrender.

"Kid's got balls," the guard notes. Skye shoots him in the knee because… yuck.

"So what's going to happen now," she tells Quinn, gun aimed at his face again, "is I'm going to jump out that window, my partner and I are going to - quite embarrassingly quickly - take out the rest of your security, and another member of my team is going to deal with Doctor Hall. Then we're going to leave. And you're not going to stop us. Understood?"

Quinn stutters at her. The compound shakes again, and Skye decides she isn't going to wait about for a response.

She turns and leaps over the balcony. She keeps her grip on her gun as she hits the water below. There are guards rounding the corner as she climbs out, and Grant doesn't turn up until she's taken the first one down.

"Took your time," she complains, dodging a punch.

"I got lost," he apologises.

* * *

She grabs him by the arm and leads him to her bunk the second their debrief from the Akela Amador mission is over.

Because this is how she deals every time she thinks she might lose him for even one terrible tiny second. Every time he does something stupid like jumping through a window and in front of a moving vehicle.

Also because those glasses were really fucking hot.

She pushes him back against the bed, and he pulls her down onto his lap. He pulls her right against him, one arm round her waist and one on the back of her neck, digging into her hair. He kisses her, bites at her bottom lip so that she moans into his mouth.

She grinds down against him until he returns the noise, and relishes in the fire she can feel building in the pit of her stomach.

While she's still just capable of forming some kind of coherent thought, she remembers thinking that this is it. If she could make him stay here forever, she would.

* * *

Grant gives her a _look_ the second Miles' name is mentioned.

Possibly because he's worried that her ex is going to spill on her much-less-than-legal search for her parents through SHIELD's records.

More likely because he is, though he would deny it to the grave, a jealous bastard who is threatened by someone she dated a million years ago.

Not that Miles isn't still attractive.

Or that she and Grant have never pretended that they won't sleep with other people. They are each other's, always. But sex is sex, and it has never been exclusive.

Not that she will be having sex with Miles.

She might be overthinking this a little.

If it was the first one that he was worrying about, he was right to.

Miles smirks the second she walks into the cage with Coulson.

"Long time, no see, baby."

"Do you know this man?" Coulson asks immediately.

"A long time ago," Skye says, honestly. "I didn't think it was relevant."

"So you did join," Miles is saying, cutting off whatever Coulson was going to reply with. "And now you're some fancy agent. Working for the very organisation keeping you in the dark."

She doesn't think Coulson would approve of her knocking out their prisoner, no matter how bad she wants to. "We're not here to talk about me," she tries, but she can tell Coulson is already hooked.

"But that is why you're here, isn't it? For yourself," Miles carries on, and Coulson doesn't stop him. "You're only here so you can dig for secrets about your past. Your parents. I bet you've been hacking away at SHIELD's files, just like I taught you." He looks up at her, waiting for her to tell him he's wrong, but she doesn't know what she can say without making herself look more guilty. "You're only here to find out about them." He pauses, looks thoughtful. "And I suppose you're here for that boy of yours, too."

Skye leaves, then, making sure to slam as many doors as possible.

Miles has gone and ruined _everything._

Except, Grant points out, when her storming ends with her walking straight into his arms, this is exactly what they need. They need Coulson to want to fix her. And what is more fixable than the tragic orphan in search of her parents.

She goes back to Coulson, apologises, suggests he continues the interrogation without her.

When it's all over - when Chan is dead and they have left Miles on the streets of Hong Kong - Coulson calls her to his office.

She passes Grant at the bar, and he insists on coming too.

Coulson sits her down, and Grant hovers near the door.

"You've been lying," Coulson snaps at her. "You've been using SHIELD - betraying the organisation that gave you a home, hacking us."

Skye wants to laugh. SHIELD never gave her a home. Grant did. Only him.

She doesn't. She slips into a perfect mix of apologetic and upset. "I just wanted to find out where I came from," she says, with a voice that sounds like it's about to break. "I promise - I've never done anything to harm SHIELD. Never." Her eyes flick to Grant when she says that, because they both know how much of a lie it is.

She pulls the little SD card from her bra. "This is everything I have on my parents. Everything leads back to a redacted file in SHIELD, and I don't have the clearance to access it." She swallows, rubbing her eye for effect. "I don't care if you kick me off this plane. I won't stop looking."

"Us," Grant puts in, and they both turn to him. "If you kick _us _off this plane."

Coulson takes the card. His face is softening already. How did a man so sympathetic ever make it so far in their world?

"I'll see what I can do," he says. "But you might not like what you find."

"Can't be worse than what I've imagined," she says, repeating something she's told Grant more times than she can remember.

Coulson nods, beginning to leave. "Don't think what you've done will be forgotten," he warns, when he reaches the door.

She nods, and he turns away.

Grant smiles at her. "See?" he whispers. "You're irresistible."

* * *

Skye watches Simmons fall, and races down to the cargo hold.

She grabs a parachute and the cure from Fitz and jumps.

* * *

Skye stands side-by-side with Grant in the Hub. Coulson and May are there too, being briefed by Victoria Hand.

"You have two agents who fit our bill," Hand says, and Skye immediately looks up at Grant.

Finally, _finally_ they get to work together like the old days.

"Agents Skye and Fitz," Hand finishes.

Skye frowns. "Fitz?" she repeats. "Are you sure?" She _shouldn't_ question the authority of her superior officers, but this is maybe the stupidest decision she's heard all day, maybe even week, and she's damn well going to question it. "Wouldn't Grant and I be more suited to it? We both have combat training and I'm competent with electronics."

"Not competent enough to disable the device, I'm afraid," Hand tells her. "But you will be able to assist him, and your field training will be enough for the two of you."

Skye gives Grant an incredulous look.

This can't be right.

And as she exits the operations room to watch Fitz thwarted by a set of doors, she decides she's probably going to die.

She says goodbye to Grant on the cargo hold.

"I'll try to come back in one piece," she jokes, and he gives her a look like he wants to throw up and a little nod.

So she gives him a quick, tight hug and leaves him with that.

Fitz insists on telling her some story about Simmons and a bunny suit and she tries to listen, she really does. But literally sixtyfive percent of the words that come out of his mouth are Simmons-related, twentyfive percent sound like sciencesciencescience to Skye's high school dropout ears, and maybe ten percent she actually understands. But most of that is the kind of horribly awkward things that only a person used to being locked up in a lab with no one but their other half would say.

She maybe underestimated the bond between Fitzsimmons. She never really had a chance to make Fitz fall for her. He was already gone.

She shouldn't underestimate Fitz in anything, she realises, when he's what saves them from a gang of angry locals. Not even accidentally, he actually _meant_ to save them as well.

He gets them across the border where Skye, with all her training, failed.

She still has to protect him, though. Because he does have absolutely _zero_ field training. And he actually tries to eat a _sandwich_, despite the fact their being tracked by dogs.

She could cry in despair.

They work well together. Not as well as he works with Simmons, or as he works with Grant, but they make a good team. Maybe it's okay that he isn't falling head over heels in love with her. Maybe friends is enough of a connection.

She's never really done 'friends'. Grant feels like more than that.

She and Fitz get the Overkill device turned off together, and they take down their attackers. Together.

As the Bus descends, Skye realises she's actually managed to get them both out of this day alive. On her own. Without Grant.

Completing a mission without him. It's a strange feeling.

They clamber into the cargo hold and the team swarms around them. Skye has never seen Simmons look more relieved. Coulson insists on shaking her hand, and May leaves the cockpit for long enough to tell her that there was no way they were going to leave them behind (and it's a gesture Skye appreciates, feeling like it might have something to do with Bahrain).

And then they're gone, and it's just her and Grant, standing in the cargo hold.

She smiles up at him, and then she can't hold it any longer, and jumps at him with a hug that makes him stumble a step back.

"Did you think you were going to have to find a new partner for a minute there?" she asks, arms still wrapped tightly around him.

"Don't," he mumbles into her hair. "Don't even joke about it."

* * *

It's been a truly, truly horrible day. She finds Grant at the bar of their Dublin hotel, a drink in front of him. She doubts it's his first.

She slides down beside him, ordering herself something. She wraps one hand around his and looks at him with worried eyes.

"I know you don't want to talk about it," she tells him. "I get it." She does - she remembers how much he dreaded going home, and she has a pretty good idea what he went through. "I try not to relive the years before I met you. Hell, even after I did. The times you weren't about to protect me."

"I failed," he says, staring blankly at the glass in front of him. "I didn't protect him, Skye."

She rubs her thumb in little circles over the back of his hand, trying to reassure him. "That wasn't your fault. I promise." She can't promise that, not really. She wasn't there. His little brother was dead before she knew him. But if it helps, she'll say it anyway.

They sit in silence, after that, for a few minutes.

"I know what I have to do," he says finally.

"You don't have to." She tells herself she's only looking out for him. Her reasons are entirely selfless. "Not tonight."

He smiles (but she can see his resignation, his exhaustion behind it). "You know I do," he says. "You know it has to be tonight."

And she does know it, so he leaves, walks to May's room instead of hers, and she doesn't stop him. She's not jealous. She can't afford that.

(Or at least, that's what she tells herself as she stares at the ceiling, trying to ignore the fact that her bed is empty for the first time in who knows how long.)

* * *

Welcome Wagon duty is probably Skye's least favourite thing ever, because nine times out of ten it goes _horribly_ wrong. Just ask May. Skye is pretty sure the current story about the last time May did Welcome Wagon involves horses and possibly a blowtorch.

So this one, obviously, goes horribly wrong, and they end up with some kind of dimension-jumping ghost on their plane. And Grant is somewhere trying to lead Fitzsimmons around the Bus, while she herself has been left to stop said ghost from attacking their guest/prisoner.

Eventually, as the lights flicker again, Skye decides enough is enough.

She unlocks the cage door, and walks Hannah out.

May must have come to the same conclusion, because she runs into her on the stairs, and the other woman doesn't question her, just opens the cargo hold for her and follows them out.

"I can take it from here," May tells her, but Skye shakes her head.

"You don't have to do this alone." She was going to. May was going to. But they don't _have_ to.

They take Hannah out to a barn, lure out the ghost, and afterwards, Skye thinks she might understand May a little more.

What's important, though, is that she _knows_ May trusts her a little more. You can't fight off a ghost together and _not_ gain a little trust for someone.

* * *

They fight their own organisation again, this time with the help of Mike Peterson.

Skye knows vaguely what's going to happen when they get to the bridge. She knows that they're going to take Coulson. She knows they're going to try and take Peterson too.

She doesn't expect the explosions, that they'll make it look like they blew a man up in front of his son. She doesn't expect Grant to get shot.

She might just have to have some serious words with Garrett about shooting one's prodigies.

Their plane is swarmed by agents, and Skye has no idea what to do, and no way to talk to Grant without the possibility of it being overheard.

So she plays along. She's genuinely worried for Coulson. She can't help but care for him. He's only ever been good to her, no matter how difficult she gets, or how many times she questions his judgement.

And she knows Garrett will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

She tries to cooperate with Victoria Hand. She's pretty sure the woman is hunting in the wrong place, but she's no way to prove it.

But Grant doesn't cooperate. He pulls out some pretty questionable interrogation techniques, and gets Skye a lead so that she can hack her way through bank accounts until she's found Coulson in the desert.

They drop off Hand and her team, continue on to get Coulson from an abandoned little town that was supposed to be a nuclear testing site.

Skye finds him in one of the wooden houses, hooked into some machine by Raina.

He looks like death warmed up, and Skye feels a tug in her chest.

It's for Garrett, she reminds herself. They have to do this, to save Garrett. Because without him, Grant would be in prison, and she would be god knows where. Maybe still with Miles, hacking the NSA for kicks and shooting up in the toilets in the McDonalds and the side of the motorway.

It has to be done.

That doesn't mean it has to feel good.

* * *

Skye attended Communications, has down training courses at Operations, but she's never been to SciOps.

While Fitzsimmons are off doing 'the talk' (which Skye has heard _way_ too many times, but must have never taken in, because it strikes her that she might be a part of exactly the kind of organisation she was being warned against), she drags Grant to have a look round.

They find the Wall of Valour. It's exactly like the ones in the Triskelion or on the Communications campus, that she's seen a thousand times but never really studied.

She doesn't study this one, either.

(Down at the Boiler Room, she pretends she doesn't notice when Grant takes a step closer in what could easily be mistaken for jealousy. He can't be jealous. That's not their style.)

Their victims turn out to be their perpetrators. Skye always finds it funny when that happens, like the universe is just trying to remind her not to ever trust first impressions.

Coulson won't look at her when she gets back onto the Bus.

She doesn't know what she's done.

He takes her aside, tells her they were down in Mexico on the trail of her parents.

"And?" she asks.

"I told you that you might not like what you find," Coulson says gently.

She smirks at that. She knows that whatever is coming is going to sting, but she smiles anyway. "I told _you _that it can't be worse than what I've imagined."

She was right. It does sting. It stings, because all she finds out is that her entire life has been destruction. That she's never been free of it.

She requests a moment, just her and Grant, back on campus, because she thinks he'll understand.

They sit against the back wall, looking up at the Wall of Valour, her head leaning against his shoulder. Him stroking her hair. And she tells him what Coulson told her. About how a village and a SHIELD team were both massacred trying to protect her.

She would stay like this, forever, if she could. Just the two of them. It's so much simpler this way.

* * *

"If I told you," Quinn asks Mike, "to shoot her - would you do it?"

Mike looks at her.

(Skye is _scared_. She can't remember the last time she was scared like this. She's going to die down here, she realises. Quinn's gun is pressed against her stomach, and even if she could disarm him, she knows the kind of power that a Deathlok possesses. Mike could stop her before she was near the door, if Quinn made him.)

"The Clairvoyant doesn't want me to hurt her. Those aren't my orders," Mike says. And leaves.

Quinn sighs. He presses the gun harder into her gut. "I don't like people who make me look bad," he says softly. "So this is for Malta," he says, and pulls the trigger. Twice. And then he's gone too, and she's on the floor.

Skye's been shot before. Once in the shoulder, once in her thigh, once that nearly hit a lung, but in the end miraculously missed any internal organs. It's not fun. Ever. But she's never been shot in the stomach at point blank range. She knows she's going to die, she knows it's unavoidable.

She can see red pooling around her. She groans, trying to drag herself towards the door.

She always knew she would die young. In her line of work, it was a pretty universal truth. She just never thought she would die alone.

She always thought he would be there.

She always thought they would go down together. They always said that they would go out fighting.

She didn't even get that. She's just going to be a body in a cellar. Nothing heroic about it.

She slips away into black, doesn't see them finding her.

* * *

For a long time, all she sees is black.

Blackblackblack.

She floats in it. Can't think, can't speak, can't move.

If this is death, it's shit.

* * *

Eventually she sees white.

He's there when she wakes up.

He looks like he might cry, but all he does is kiss her forehead, because Simmons is there almost straight away, shooing him out.

He sneaks back in the evening, holds her hand like he's never going to let go, and catches her up on what she missed while she was out.

Garrett turned up. Helped to save her.

"That's good," Skye says. "Maybe what saved me can help save him."

Grant gives her a strange little look, and nods. Skye thought he would be happier about it.

Garrett had brought along his latest specialist, who apparently had a thing for Simmons.

Grant's called it off with May, too.

"Why?" Skye asks.

He just shrugs. "I had her trust. I didn't think it was necessary to continue."

But something's changed. Something's different, and Skye knows it.

Maybe it was just the scare of nearly losing her.

* * *

She might still be recovering, but Skye is _not_ going to sit by and watch her partner be mind-controlled by some Asgardian bitch.

Skye ignores Simmons' protests as she straps herself into a bulletproof vest and heads for the van with Coulson.

"I'm doing this," she tells him. Honestly, she's pretty pissed at him for being stupid enough to let any men near Lorelei in the first place. She's going to guilt trip the hell out of him, and not feel even a little bit bad. "Try to stop me, and you'll probably hurt me more."

Coulson looks, for a moment, like he might protest too. "Fine," he says. "Get in."

She slips into the back seat, with Simmons and May in the front. "Vegas," she says. "Fast as you can go, and we can cut them off before they get there."

"How can you be sure?" May asks her.

Skye gives her a look. "I'm sure," she says. "Make sure to get Sif and that collar there."

Three all-female SHIELD teams and Lady Sif cut off Lorelei and Grant on a highway in Nevada.

And Grant is good. But nobody is good enough to take down that kind of power.

There's a pretty epic showdown between Sif and Lorelei. Grant is restrained for the whole thing, with Skye hovering over him. He comes back to his senses the second Sif collars Lorelei.

He blinks at her. "Skye?"

"You're back," she whispers, breathing a sigh of relief. "Thank god."

"Skye?" he repeats. "Why are you here? You need to be _resting._" He's towering over her now, getting all angry, dragging her by the hand back to the van, and she just _laughs_. Doubles over, wheezing, arms clutching round her waist, because she thinks otherwise she might burst into tears. Because thank god, thank god he's back and she's back, and somehow they're both still alive.

* * *

SHIELD is getting too close to the Clairvoyant, too close to Garrett, and Skye knows something is coming.

When Mike leads them to a faux Clairvoyant in the basement of a racetrack, she thinks she understands. It's a way to get them off the trail, to make them think they've caught the real Clairvoyant, when really they've caught someone whose every word Garrett can control.

She thought Garrett would have told her. Or at least told Grant, who would have then passed on the information. She doesn't question it. Garrett will have his reasons.

Nash's first few lines are predictable, but when he starts talking about her, about how they're going to get her, she can't help but feel sick.

The sound of a gunshot rings through the room as soon as Nash makes the mistake of putting the word 'Skye' and anything death-related in the same sentence.

Grant's still pointing the pistol at Nash's chest. She gently eases it out of his hand, and watches as they walk him away from her.

He looks up when she walks into the interrogation room, smiles slightly. She's had May turn off the monitoring on them, insisting that it is between her and her partner.

She hands over a bottle of water, sits down at the table with him across from her.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" she hisses at him.

He's silent, staring at her. "Skye…" he begins, and trails off again.

"Why did Garrett have you shoot Nash? It was _stupid_, and now you're going off to review and we're being separated," she says, but he doesn't answer. "Why didn't you _tell _me you were going to do it?"

"Skye…" he starts again. "I didn't tell you because it was supposed to be Coulson that snapped. I wasn't supposed to shoot him."

Skye frowns. "What? You disobeyed orders? Why?"

"You know," he says (and she does). "He got to me. I couldn't let him talk about -" He cuts himself off.

He's unable to contemplate life without her.

She can't even consider a life without him.

(God, they're a mess.)

"I'm sorry," he says finally. He's not looking at her anymore. His gaze is a little vacant, glassy, fixed somewhere on wall behind her head. "I can't let him hurt you."

Skye shakes her head, still frowning in confusion. "No one is going to hurt me," she promises. "It was just to get Coulson to react, right?"

His eyes slide back to her. "Yeah," he says, far too sadly for Skye to be able to believe him. "No one's going to hurt you."

She thinks there might be a 'because I won't ever let them' left hanging in the air, but neither of them makes any move to catch it.

"I should go," she whispers.

* * *

Garrett lands on the plane.

Hydra outs itself. She feels her stomach drop to her feet. This is it.

They let out Grant from the cage, and when she breaks the news to him his face goes pale and his hand grips hers so tight it hurts.

* * *

They drop down into the janitor's closet. Grant checks the number of men outside the door, swears quietly, and turns to her.

"I need to get you to that processing centre," he says. He's not looking at her. He's checking his weapons. "Give me your ICER."

"What?" she asks, turning on him. "You're not going out there alone," she snaps at him.

"Skye." His voice is steady, final. "I have to."

"Why?" she hisses. "You'll get yourself killed."

"Maybe…" he begins, and trails off. "That man I killed, Skye. He was innocent. We both know that."

"We do awful things in the name of SHIELD or Hydra all the time. Don't fukcing _dare _go all noble on me now." Her hands are on her hips, and she's angry. Trying to be angry. God, he frustrates her when he does this.

He sighs. "You don't understand," he starts. But he doesn't finish, and she knows he's never going to.

"You can't go out there," she says again. "We'll find another way to get me down there."

"There's too many of them, Skye." He's gone all quiet, resigned to his fate.

She lets out a huff. "If you think for a second I'm going to let you die for me," she starts, and breaks off again, letting the threat hang. "Can't we just, y'know, go all _hail Hydra _at them?" She's grasping at straws here.

"You _know_ we can't," he says. "It's not like they'll just let us pass to ruin their defences. Besides, Garrett wants us to maintain cover as long as possible. We follow orders. We're SHIELD until he tells us we're not."

"This isn't how it works," she says finally. "We do things together."

"Not this time," he says. "You have to get to that room. Garrett and the team are relying on us."

Silence.

"Grant," she whispers in the dark.

He pushes her back against the wall and kisses her. She pulls herself up automatically so her legs are round his waist, and her fingers go to his hair. He bites her bottom lip and she moans.

"I love you," he whispers into her hair, and Skye just nods against him.

He isn't asking for her to say it back. He isn't asking for her to reciprocate. She knows he would never ask that of her.

"I know," she says. "I'm sorry. It was never supposed to turn out like this. I'm sorry."

It was always going to turn out like this.

He kisses her again. Softer, finger tracing along her jaw, and kisses her again at her hairline. She hopes that this isn't his stupid way of saying goodbye.

He draws away, and she untangles herself from him, letting him go. "Close the door behind me," he says, and she nods.

She leans against the wall with her eyes closed, listening to the crunch of bones and praying they're not his, because if they are, she doesn't know what she'll do.

He loves her. She knows that. She sees it in the way he breathes, in the way he looks at her, kisses her.

She isn't sure if she loves him. She _needs_ him. She can't comprehend a life without him. She works best as his other half. He knows her, right down to her tar black soul, and he hasn't abandoned her.

Is that love?

It's hard to tell, when you've had as little experience as she has.

She doesn't know how she got here. She was never supposed to get here. She was supposed to be coldhearted and coldblooded. And now she has a team she cares about.

And a man she maybe possibly loves.

(How do you tell?)

She presses her eyes a little tighter shut, waiting for answers. Or a Hydra agent to burst through the door. Her fingers are clenched around her gun (bad technique, she can hear him reminding her - he was always the better shot), and if anyone but Grant comes through that door, she won't hesitate to shoot. She's too confused, now, as to who is an enemy and who is a friend, to bother distinguishing.

The door bangs open, and she turns, alert and ready to shoot.

It's him.

She practically throws herself at him, arms going around his neck and legs locking around his waist. He stumbles a step back (because while yes, he's strong, he seems pretty beaten up, and she did just fly at him).

"Please don't do that again," she manages. (She's _not _holding back tears. Tears are weak. She won't cry, not even for him.)

He makes no promises, just kisses her, then stares at her with big dark sad eyes like he knows a million terrible things.

Maybe he does. She wouldn't put it past him.

"We should go," he says, and she nods, for the second time in a short space sliding back down to the ground. "Ready to hack this system?" he asks her, and she allows herself a smile.

"Who said anything about hack?" she says, ripping her bag open to reveal it stuffed with explosives.

He grins at her, all lopsided, and she wants to kiss it off his face.

* * *

Coulson breaks the news to them together that Garrett is Hydra, and Grant looks at her with an expression that Coulson will probably mistake for betrayal.

But Skye knows what it is. It's a tiny bit of his soft heart being chipped away, because this is it. They have to leave. They have to burn everything they've built over the last few months with this team. Burn it to the ground.

"We'd like to go with you," he tells Agent Hand, with one arm firmly wrapped around Skye. "He was our mentor. We'd like to see him to the darkest cell in the Fridge."

When Hand escorts the to the plane, Skye doesn't look back to see her team.

She sits beside Grant on the journey, an uneasy feeling in her stomach.

Hand's saying something about putting Garrett six feet under, and when Grant stands up, Skye follows, knowing what they have to do.

She shoots Hand. He takes the two guards.

"Welcome back, kids," Garrett says.

(And Skye wants to be sick.

Why does she want to be sick?)


End file.
